On the bus the other day it crossed my mind that facebook and myspace and linkedin and yelp and xing and all of these networks where I am signed up online would not get to know if I died.
So what happens? Is that now the new responsibility of the relatives to deal with all these profiles, besides having to plan the funeral and all the other things one has to do? And how would my relatives know all the networks where I'm registered? And the passwords?
A potential future idea is to start an 'online undertaker' business, a service that helps you deal with the internet life of your deceased relatives. Maybe even offer a DVD with the online profiles for memory's sake?
I know, I know, it sounds very weird. But it sure will become more and more of and issue the more the internet becomes the center of our lives. And as I get older and older (and let's assume that e.g. facebook still exists in 50 years) I don't want to have dead people amongst my contacts and friends. But un-friending them does not seem right either. And what if they send an update from 'up there'? I know I will be using the internet when I will be a Senior so there had better be a clean solution until then.
Also website user numbers will raise higher and higher the older a company becomes, and no new company can compete with those numbers as the dead people will always be counted in. And will death metrics show up in Media Metrix in the future? How many females, males, how meany deceased? It's only fair, as the deceased were at one point users and did not choose to leave the service, instead just died.
So many questions, no answer from my side yet. The only thing I know now is I don't want to be the one building the online undertaker service, I am not much of an undertaker, not even online - - feel free to give me equity for stealing the idea though, if you do.
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